On the surface, a five-movement experimental opera set in various New Orleans neighborhoods called “Ecohybridity” doesn’t present as the most accessible form of theatre.

But creator Kai Barrow, a Durham, North Carolina, transplant to New Orleans, says the so-called “visual opera” will resonate with disenfranchised people of color who birthed much of what we love about New Orleans yet remain the city’s most neglected residents.

“Opera was originally a people’s form that would go from community to community. It was a way to articulate what was going on through art. But somewhere along the line, it became an elitist form, and poor people of color were locked out of the medium,” she explains over a crackling phone line from New Orleans. “But our conditioning right now, how we’re managing to exist, is opera in its largest sense. It’s comedy, it’s tragedy, it’s all of these different parts.”

“Ecohybridity” springs from Barrow’s experiences with eviction in Durham. That dislocation was made more resonant in post-Katrina New Orleans, where her Gallery of the Streets provides space for highlighting artists of color.

While organizers call “Ecohybridity” an opera, the show is much more immersive and fluid. It incorporates contemporary music, paintings and the open canvas of New Orleans. It’s Afrofuturist in its presentation but classic at its core.

Take a look at the cast of characters and you’ll get a sense of how the show is creating something new. One character, named Madame Sankofa (The People’s Diva), requires the performer to channel Mahalia Jackson, Nina Simone, Laurie Anderson and Lauryn Hill. Another, O.G. Falcon (The Butch of the Ashes) is rooted in Bessie Smith and the Sex Pistols, among others. These more contemporary influences ground the opera in something relatable despite the high-mindedness of the concept.

All of this is couched in Barrow’s and her colleagues’ tacit understanding of what it means to be contemporary black creatives (particularly as black women) in New Orleans, to deal with the pressures of municipal and cultural exploitation.

“I think all of us are pretty aware of how the city of New Orleans is exploiting our work for tourism. Tourism is higher than its ever been, and a lot of the traditional arts communities here are barely hanging on,” says Barrow. ”Folks are really being squeezed out, and we’re linking our work aesthetically and materially to have a picture of our place in this broader movement—gentrification on one hand, and institutional bodies that are coming in on the other.”

Adds S. Mandisa Moore-O’Neal, a New Orleans native and an “Echohybridity” writer and performer: ”Right now is such a tender time for so many of us in the Gulf who have roots and history in this place,” she says. “As a local black feminist, rebuilding and resistance looks like rendering ourselves visible over these last 10 years and well before. [It means] telling the complex stories of black women and girls—trans and not-trans, of course—on our terms, in our voices.”

“Ecohybridity” begins tonight at 7 p.m. at Indigo House at the Joan Mitchell Center. Visit galleryofthestreets.org for the full schedule, and click here to see a livestream.

“. . .federal judges obstructed exposure of Sarbanes-Oxley NONPROFIT illegalities and frauds pertaining to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita disasters, community block grants, and unlawful nonprofit dealings that re-victimized scores of displaced evacuees. . . some of us were deliberately prevented from returning to New Orleans –as well as excluded from economic opportunities in the places where we are forced to reside (as some of us are being unlawfully used by NGOs as commodities for federal dollars).

The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Legal Services –42 U.S.C. § 5182 appears to be the primary tool for nonprofit pilfering of government provisions and funds, and for outrageous unscrupulous exploitation of classes of disaster victims –ESPECIALLY evacuees who naively came to Shreveport.

. . .legal profession-controlled nonprofits and foundations created with or from CyPres settlement money and government contracts evolve around “At-Risk
Youth” and their families, nursing homes, and government agencies –especially after a Presidentially-declared disaster affords the American Bar Association’s confederations with HUD and the Federal Emergency Management Agency(FEMA) to take advantage of42 U.S.C. § 5182 while pretending to aid certain classes of disaster victims.

Personally –on behalf of myself and other exploited disaster victims I know– what I (we) wish to adamantly interject, is that disaster victims who evacuated because of Rita, Katrina, oil spills, wild fires, and so, DO NOT MERELY need a dwelling place so that nonprofit can unbeknownst to us insert us on their logs so that such faith-based groups and nonprofits can use us as commodity for purposes of acquiring Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) dollars! We would have preferred to reside –and become logged on registers in our home towns and among
our families and friends –if only we had been informed that government $$$$$$$$$$$ was being given to such organizations such as the ones tied to nonprofit.
. . . aside from a roof, disaster and evacuated people want and need employment as well as meaningful activity –like any other human! Disaster and evacuated people do not appreciate it all that nonprofit entities withheld from us information about recovery provisions –beyond initial FEMA dollars, while unbeknownst to us collecting so-called “Emergency Shelter” and "Continuum of Care" funding, instead of enabling us to reside in locations of our familiar families and friends! We loathe that we were not informed that under the Stafford Act we were allowed medical, burial, storage, dental, relocation, case management, job training and placement, and so on! We do not appreciate it all, to be forced to reside in your cities where you refuse to allow us even an opportunity at employment, dignity, a sense of community –and you unfairly compete and destroy our businesses!

The INSULT of deceitful nonprofits, foundations, Third Sector, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), Volunteerism, and whatever other labels they give themselves, is the lack of competitive opportunities and open bidding for careers and jobs; and some of them are involved in deceptive business trade practice, and unfair competition. Also, a business that acquires a FEMA or HUD contract -and most likely CyPres funding- for “tracking” people, providing “information, ”likely (wire tapping), and privacy invasion regarding beneficiaries of government benefits SHOULD
employ some percentage of those beneficiary people, so they’ll not need
benefits. . .”

“. . .federal judges obstructed exposure of Sarbanes-Oxley NONPROFIT illegalities and frauds pertaining to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita disasters, community block grants, and unlawful nonprofit dealings that re-victimized scores of displaced evacuees. . . some of us were deliberately prevented from returning to New Orleans –as well as excluded from economic opportunities in the places where we are forced to reside (as some of us are being unlawfully used by NGOs as commodities for federal dollars).

The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Legal Services –42 U.S.C. § 5182 appears to be the primary tool for nonprofit pilfering of government provisions and funds, and for outrageous unscrupulous exploitation of classes of disaster victims.

. . .legal profession-controlled nonprofits and foundations created with or from CyPres settlement money and government contracts evolve around “At-Risk
Youth” and their families, nursing homes, and government agencies –especially after a Presidentially-declared disaster affords the American Bar Association’s confederations with HUD and the Federal Emergency Management Agency(FEMA) to take advantage of42 U.S.C. § 5182 while pretending to aid certain classes of disaster victims.

Personally –on behalf of myself and other exploited disaster victims I know– what I (we) wish to adamantly interject, is that disaster victims who evacuated because of Rita, Katrina, oil spills, wild fires, and so, DO NOT MERELY need a dwelling place so that nonprofit can unbeknownst to us insert us on their logs so that such faith-based groups and nonprofits can use us as commodity for purposes of acquiring Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) dollars! We would have preferred to reside –and become logged on registers in our home towns and among our families and friends –if only we had been informed that government $$$$$$$$$$$ was being given to such organizations such as the ones tied to nonprofit.

. . . aside from a roof, disaster and evacuated people want and employment as well as meaningful activity –like any other human! Disaster and evacuated people do not appreciate it all that nonprofit entities withheld from us information about recovery provisions –beyond initial FEMA dollars, while unbeknownst to us collecting so-called “Emergency Shelter” and "Continuum of Care" funding, instead of enabling us to reside in locations of our familiar families and friends! We loathe that we were not informed that under the Stafford Act we were allowed medical, burial, storage, dental, relocation, case management, job training and placement, and so on! We do not appreciate it all, to be forced to reside in your cities where you refuse to allow us even an opportunity at employment, dignity, a sense of community –and you unfairly compete and destroy our businesses!

The INSULT of deceitful nonprofits, foundations, Third Sector, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), Volunteerism, and whatever other labels they give themselves, is the lack of competitive opportunities and open bidding for careers and jobs; and some of them are involved in deceptive business trade practice, and unfair competition. Also, a business that acquires a FEMA or HUD contract -and most likely CyPres funding- for “tracking” people, providing “information, ”likely (wire tapping), and privacy invasion regarding beneficiaries of government benefits SHOULD employ some percentage of those beneficiary people, so they’ll not need benefits. . .”